A Light From the Shadows Shall Spring
by 21ShootingStars
Summary: Spencer Reid didn't believe in magic. At least, he didn't believe in magic until he started showing signs of being a wizard. Even then, he found it difficult to accept. That didn't stop him from learning all that the wizarding world could teach him.
1. Prologue

For as long as Spencer could remember, Diana Reid was always different from the other kids' mothers. No one else's mother, as far as he knew of anyway, had raised them to mistrust the police. No one else's mother, as far as he knew of anyway, had read them Chaucer instead of picture books. One thing that Spencer was absolutely positive of was that no one else's mother believed she'd grown up in a world of magic, seen her older brother go off to a magical boarding school, and eagerly awaited the day she could go only to discover that she hadn't inherited her family's magical abilities.

Even by the age of four, he didn't believe in his mother's stories about places with weird names like Hogwarts, Diagon Alley, and Gringotts. He had too much faith in science to believe in something he'd never seen proof of.

By age five, he knew that his mother was schizophrenic and that his parents were having problems.

When he was six, Spencer began to wonder if he might be just as sick as his mum. Because that was the only way he could rationalize his favorite book suddenly appearing in his bedroom when he knew for a fact that one of his many tormenters had stolen the book earlier that day.

On Spencer's eighth birthday, when nobody came to the party his mum insisted on throwing for him, he had his fifth burst of what he would later discover was accidental magic. It was the first time either of his parents saw it happen. That day was also the last time he saw his dad and, even though his mother told him she didn't blame him for anything, Spencer knew it was his magical outburst that made William Reid leave; no man as perfectly normal as William Reid could stand living with a woman who could barely keep track of what year it was and an eight year old who could banish every party decoration in sight with nothing more than his mind.

When Spencer was nine, his mother had a few really good weeks. During this time, she took him on his first trip to Diagon Alley. Even seeing it with his own eyes could barely convince Spencer it was real.

By October 9th, 1991, when Spencer turned eleven and received his Hogwarts letter, he'd read through at least a hundred books from Flourish and Blotts. He could barely believe there'd been a time he doubted the existence of this world.

September 1st, 1992, he went to Kings Cross and boarded the scarlet steam engine at platform nine and three quarters. However, through his excitement there was the lingering feeling that he shouldn't be doing this, shouldn't be going so far away from his mother who needed him so badly. As the train pulled away from the station and he waved at Diana Reid one last time, Spencer made a promise to himself. He swore that if she wasn't managing well enough on her own when he went home for the winter holidays he would stay with her; he would return to the real world and take care of his mother if that's what he had to do.

But by the time the little boat carrying him, a tiny blonde-haired girl with huge silver eyes, and two entirely unremarkable young boys, made its way across the lake and Spencer caught his first glimpse of Hogwarts, his new home and his fresh start, he wasn't sure if he'd be able to keep the silent promise he'd made.


	2. September 1st, 1992

As Spencer and his fellow first years were herded into the castle by the largest man Spencer had ever seen, he overheard one of the boys he shared a boat with whispering to the other. "That guy must be a giant. I've never met one before, but no normal wizard could be that big."

"Actually," Spencer corrected, "giants are, on average, around five meters in height. That man can't be much more than three. If anything, he's probably a half-giant. Or he could just be extraordinarily tall; the tallest man ever recorded, Robert Wadlow, was 272 centimeters tall. If muggles can be that large, then who knows how tall a wizard could be?" Spencer noticed the stares his rambling had earned him, but he couldn't help it. The more nervous or excited he became, the more freedom words and facts and statistics tended to have in just falling out of his mouth. And he was undeniably both nervous and excited; between the upcoming sorting and, finally, getting a chance to really practice magic, who wouldn't be? He opened his mouth to begin spouting statistics and theories about how magic could affect lifespan and growth rates in magical people, but was interrupted by the opening of the large, wooden doors that the group was crowded in front of before he could get another word out.

A stern looking woman whose hair was pulled back into a very strict bun greeted the group. Welcome to Hogwarts,' said the woman. 'I am Professor McGonagall, the deputy headmistress here at Hogwarts. The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory and spend free time in your house common room.

'The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points, while any rule-breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the House Cup, a great honour. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours."

Then, without waiting for any sort of response, she looked them over one last time, sharp eyes landing disapprovingly on a few of the more rumpled eleven year olds, nodded once, said "Follow me" and turned sharply on her heel to lead the students into the Great Hall.

A few of the students tripped on their cloaks in their haste to follow her, but Spencer took one last moment to collect himself before following. He looked at the blonde girl next to him, recognizing her from his boat, and she aimed a brilliant, friendly smile at him when she caught his eye. He gave a shy grin in return, then let out a most undignified squeak as she grabbed his elbow and began tugging him after the other students and into the Great Hall. "Come on," she said. "We don't want to be the last ones out here."

He tuned out most of the sorting, only paying attention to the first few people to get an idea of what he should expect, and instead looked at the people already seated at the five long tables in the Hall, trying to gather whatever information he could. Mostly, he gathered, everyone was hungry.

He was pulled from his musings by the sound of Professor McGonagall calling out a familiar surname. "Lovegood, Luna," she called, and Spencer's quick mind didn't take even a second to remember that Lovegood was his mother's maiden name. Was this "Luna" related to him? He'd never had any family outside of his parents… For the second time in as many moments, he was pulled from his thoughts as the girl next to him, Luna, he supposed, began to walk through the much smaller crowd of still-standing first years.

This sorting he actually paid attention to. As the old hat slid over her head, falling low enough to obscure most of her face, he would have sworn that a bemused expression crossed the hat's face, if hats could have bemused expressions. But the hat didn't stay on her head long enough for him to really analyze its facial expressions ( _and since when did hats have ANY sort of expressions,_ Spencer couldn't help but wonder) before it bellowed out a loud "RAVENCLAW!" and Luna was free to join her new classmates.

Spencer wasn't sure how he felt about her being sorted into the house he was almost positive he would be placed in. On one hand, she had been friendly toward him, which he wasn't used to in the least, and she might be _family._ On the other hand, Spencer had read about squibs and how their families often treated them; if she was related to him through his mother, would she still want to associate with him when she found out who he was? Or would he, again, be shunned by those he least expected it from? He allowed himself a few moments to think about all of the many ways this could end poorly.

"Reid, Spencer," McGonagall called, once again pulling him out of his wandering thoughts.

Skirting around the remaining six students, carefully avoiding contact with any of them, Spencer made his way to the wobbly, three-legged stool in the front of the Hall. Pretending that all eyes weren't on him made it easier for him to calm his breathing and racing heart. He couldn't help but panic, wondering if the hat might just tell him it had all been a mistake, or if he would wake up now and realize it was all a dream, and he would have to go back to the little flat he and his mother occupied in London. Clenching his fingers around the solid wood of the stool and feeling the old material of the hat slipping over his head helped ground him, the sensations reminding him that this was real. That he was a wizard. That he would get to explore entire new realms of knowledge.

As he took another deep breath, he heard a voice speaking directly into his mind and almost panicked again before recognizing the voice as belonging to the old hat.

" _Well, well, what do we have here? Let's see… Nothing Gryffindor about you, is there? No, you don't value bravery; you're much more likely to do the sensible thing and save your own skin, am I right? That's a pretty Slytherin mindset, but, no, you wouldn't like it there either; too much scheming and too much attention being paid to politics… What's this? You take care of your mother? Such loyalty. Maybe Hufflepuff? No, no, you're a Ravenclaw. I can see that now. You don't even care about getting to actually_ use _magic, do you? You just want to learn everything there is to know about it and this world. Yes, I think you'll do well in_ RAVENCLAW!"

Removing the hat from his head as soon possible (he decided right then that he NEVER wanted to experience anything like that again; he didn't like having a voice other than his own inside his head), Spencer stood from the stool on shaky legs and made his way to the Ravenclaw table, where the students, both old and new, were clapping and cheering. He saw Luna shuffling over to make room on the bench next to her and looking at him with hopeful eyes; though part of him doubted the wisdom of trying to get close to her (after all, that never went well for him before and there were so many reasons that Luna might not want to be his friend for long) he felt his feet moving toward her almost of their own accord. Maybe it would be okay, he thought, just this once, since she might be _family_ , to try to make a friend.

"Hello," she said as he sat next to her, "are you excited for classes to start? I am. Daddy's been teaching me useful little things every so often for as long as I can remember, but I really can't wait to learn about some of the subjects he's not so good at. He's a terrible potioneer. And he can't do charms to save his life; Mummy was a Charms Mistress, though." As she spoke he noticed the whimsical quality to her voice. It fascinated him; she was clearly speaking to him, but the tone of her voice made it seem like she could be talking to both anything and nothing at the same time.

"Um," He wasn't sure which part of her statement to respond to first. He eventually decided to avoid the potentially sore subject of her mother's apparent loss, and replied "I'm very excited to start classes. I've got a pretty solid muggle education background," (Spencer chose not to mention the fact that he'd just finished his A-levels; nobody here needed to know that. It would just set him apart from the others like it had done at his previous schools) "but most of my knowledge of the magical world comes from books I've read in Diagon Alley, so I can't wait to get to actually casting spells. I practiced a few on the train, just some of the simpler ones that I've read up on, but I hope there's something more challenging waiting for us in tomorrow's lessons."

"Oh! You were raised by muggles? What's that like? I bet it was fascinating; muggles are so interesting." For the first time since he sat down, he felt like he actually had most of her attention. He couldn't decide whether he liked the feeling or if he'd rather she go back to her airy way of half paying attention to him from earlier.

"N-not exactly. My mother was, uh, raised in the wizarding world. But she… left. And she's, uh, always been too sick to teach me much about anything related to this world. So I was kind of raised as a muggle, I guess."

She looked at him with her silvery eyes, and he felt like she was peering straight into his soul, before letting the conversation drop as the Headmaster stood up from his golden, throne-like chair to welcome them all and to begin the feast. As mountains of food appeared on the table, Spencer took the opportunity to avoid further conversation by filling his plate and digging in to a meal more delicious than one he'd had in a while; he had to learn to cook once his father left, because though Diana Reid was capable of cooking extremely well she often didn't think about things as simple as eating regular meals, and while he could manage a few simple things Spencer would never be considered a five-star chef.

After he ate his fill, Spencer spent the rest of the meal once again people-watching. There was a bit of a commotion at one point when a black-clad professor stormed dramatically out of the Great Hall, causing the students to break out into curious whispers, wondering who was in enough trouble this early in the term to make the professor, who Spencer discovered was called Snape, so angry. Spencer made a mental note to avoid the man's bad side; though, from what he was hearing and from the man's angry countenance that Spencer had noticed a few times that evening, Spencer thought the Professor might not actually have a _good_ side.

After the meal and Headmaster Dumbledore's introduction of the newest addition to the teaching staff and reminders about a few rules, the students all filed out of the Great Hall. Spencer absently followed the rest of the Ravenclaws up to the fifth floor through a series of staircases with a mind of their own and seemingly endless hallways until they arrived at a stretch of wall with none of the moving paintings that he was still trying to wrap his usually-so-scientific mind around. Instead, there was just a bronze, eagle-shaped knocker.

"This is the entrance to our common room. In order to gain entrance, you have to solve a riddle. If you get it wrong, you'll have to wait around out here until someone who knows the answer comes along. I'm going to let you first years try to figure it out this time, so I hope you're good at riddles." With that, the prefect they'd followed to this point reached her hand up and grasped the bronze knocker, knocking once, and causing the knocker to open its mouth and speak.

"Feed me and I live, yet give me a drink and I die. What am I?"

The answer tumbled past Spencer's lips before he could stop himself or even wait long enough to give the others a chance to think. "Fire."

All eyes turned toward him and he began to flush, but the attention of the first years was quickly reclaimed by the appearance of a doorway in the previously solid stone.

"Good guess, little guy," said the prefect, reaching over to ruffle his hair as he passed by her on his way into the common room.

"It wasn't a guess," Spencer replied as he ducked out of her reach before could reach his hair. He didn't like physical contact much, it was a byproduct of him learning at a young age that his mother would react unpredictably to touch and his years of having to deal with endless stream of bullies.

As soon as the prefect told the first-years how to find their beds, almost everyone was off to sleep, exhausted by the long train ride and heavy meal. Spencer joined his new dorm-mates in their room, pulling the blue curtains closed around his bed, but he couldn't sleep; he was too excited by the prospect of classes the next day.

To pass the time until morning, he decided to pick up where he'd left off when the train arrived in Hogsmeade, practicing some of the simpler spells in his books, ones he didn't think could be dangerous to work on without supervision.

By morning, he was floating a quill around with barely any thought, able to unlock his trunk with a quick "Alohamora" (which reminded him that he should look up some security spells, he'd already had more than enough experience with having his belongings taken from him while at school over the years), and was well on his way to transfiguring a matchstick into a needle. He was also pretty sure he'd managed to cast a few small jinxes, the trip jinx and jelly-legs and the like, but he'd need a chance to practice on someone to be completely positive they worked as aiming them at his pillow could only tell him so much.


	3. Spencer- suspended?

Everything at his school was completely illogical, Spencer quickly discovered. Who designed a school with staircases that _moved?_ And what possible reason was there for the way wizards still wrote with quills? (Spencer stubbornly refused to take notes with a quill; muggle writing instruments were quicker, easier, and neater. He only used quills on his assignments.) And did these people even bother interviewing candidates for open teaching positions before hiring someone? Because Spencer might be new to the wizarding world, but even he knew that Gilderoy Lockhart was a fraud; his lies could be read in his body language even if one were gullible enough to consider believing a word out of the man's mouth in the first place.

After a little over a month at Hogwarts, Spencer was torn between loving and hating the school; it was fascinating, getting to learn actual _magic_ and having access to a thousand years' worth of information in the library, but he was annoyed by how backwards certain aspects of this world were.

And he absolutely _hated_ most of his fellow Ravenclaws. Well, no, that's not quite right. He hated the ones who treated Luna like a freak and he hated the Ravenclaws who used a jinx he hadn't quite figured out how to break (it stuck his tongue to the roof of his mouth, and he couldn't find mention of it in any books _anywhere)_ to silence him whenever he started rambling instead of just telling him to bugger off like the more reasonable of his housemates would do.

One day (October 11th, to be precise) he just didn't have the patience for it anymore. His short fuse that day was probably ( _definitely)_ caused by his mother's apparent forgetting of his existence. He'd written her every day, without fail, since he arrived at Hogwarts, and every morning he would try not to get his hopes up that this would be the day he got a response. When his birthday passed with no word, he thought maybe, just maybe, she'd written and her letter had been delayed. But by two days later he was sure he'd been forgotten; either that or his mother had proven unable to take care of herself and would be either missing or dead when he finally got a chance to go home in the winter.

He took a breath, trying not to think that way, trying not to panic while sitting in his last class of the day.

'She's fine,' he told himself. 'She's an adult, she doesn't need a kid to take care of her. She probably just hasn't had a chance to respond to my letters.'

All day long he'd been having these thoughts, his impressive mind refusing to let him forget his worries. And all day long he'd been snapping at people, barely stopping himself from hexing someone just to make himself feel better.

But as the Ravenclaw and Gryffindor first years shuffled out of Charms, one of the Gryffindor boys tripped Luna, causing both her and her books to fall to the unyielding stone floor.

It was the sound of her saying, airy and whimsical as ever, "Oh, those pesky nargles are always underfoot. I'll have to watch them closer in the future," that finally sent him over the edge.

The anger, confusion, and worry he'd been feeling bubbled out of the young wizard in a burst of violence that he'd never really considered himself capable of, and would later find hard to accept had truly come from him.

Before anyone had a chance to react, the Gryffindor boy had become the test subject Spencer hadn't been able to find for all of the minor hexes and jinxes he'd been practicing since arriving at Hogwarts. The dazed boy looked like a disaster, and not one of the natural variety. Bat bogeys flapped around his head, his legs collapsed beneath him from a well-aimed jelly-legs, and he'd broken out into boils from a quick "Furnunculus!" that Spencer honestly hadn't been sure he could cast successfully.

"Mr. Reid! That is quite enough! Go to my office immediately." Spencer hadn't known Professor Flitwick could sound quite that angry, had never imagined the diminutive man had it in him. When the boy hesitated before moving away from the scene, the Charms professor snapped out a harsh "Now, Mr. Reid!" before continuing his quick pace toward the Gryffindor boy. As Spencer finally started to back away from the chaos he had caused, he heard Flitwick casting a series of counter-curses and dealing with the mess of a Gryffindor.

Seeing Luna looking at him with wide, curious eyes, as if she couldn't believe he'd done all of that because the idiot boy had tripped her, brought him out of his hazy state, made him really think about what had just occurred. He turned around and fled the scene, quickly making his way to stand outside of Flitwick's office.

Just as what he'd done was truly beginning to sink in and Spencer started to worry about consequences, the Charms professor arrived. When Spencer opened his mouth to speak, to explain (though he had no idea _how_ he would explain what just happened), he was cut off by a harsh "I don't want to hear any excuses. Just tell me what happened, and maybe help me to understand why I shouldn't have you expelled and on your way home immediately." All of this was said as the professor waved his wand, unlocking the door, and ushered Spencer into the office. "Sit, Mr. Reid, and start explaining."

Spencer sat. But explaining? He had no idea where to start. He had no idea how to justify what he'd done, and the guilt was starting to eat him alive.

"Will he be okay?" The newly-twelve year old boy couldn't even look at his professor.

"Now you're worried about the safety of your classmates? Well, better late than never I suppose. Yes, Mr. Johnson will be fine. Thankfully, all of your spells appear to have been accurately cast, so there will be no unanticipated effects from the assault he experienced." Spencer winced at the word 'assault,' but he knew it was accurate. "Are you going to explain yourself or should I just go ahead and start the expulsion process?"

"I'm still trying to understand it myself, professor. He just- he tripped Luna, and I- I lost it. Some things have been-" Tough? Impossible? Confusing? "bothering me lately, and I haven't been in much control of myself." Spencer still couldn't look at his professor for longer than a brief glance every so often. "I'll understand completely if you expel me. In fact, it might be better. I- I'm needed at home. And I could go to Uni in London and be home every night."

Before Spencer could completely talk his way into believing the expulsion he might be facing would be the best thing to ever happen to him, his Head of House stopped him. "Wait a moment, Mr. Reid. Start from the beginning, what's bothering you? And, just so you know, I've never expelled a first year for a first offense; I was trying to scare you into giving me a truthful answer, and apparently I did so too effectively. So, just calm down, and start from the beginning. What caused this to happen today? And not just the immediate cause; I need to know what is affecting one of my students so strongly, preferably _before_ things like this happen in the future."

Looking at the man, finally, Spencer could detect no hint of a lie in his body language, and he let out a sigh of relief; as much as he would understand if he was expelled, and would be able to turn the situation to his advantage by going home and to University, he liked the idea of not being expelled a lot more.

"My- my mother is sick. She's got schizophrenia, it's a mental disorder- I don't know if witches and wizards get it but basically what it means is that she has trouble with a lot of the things we wouldn't think twice about; her thoughts aren't as clear as they could be, she hallucinates sometimes, and she's not always so in touch with reality. There's a lot more to it than that, but you get the idea. And it's just the two of us, we haven't seen my father in four years and two days. And I take care of her, but I can't do that from here. I thought it would be okay, that I'd write her and check up on her, but I've written every day, honestly every single day since I got here, and she hasn't written me back once. She didn't even write on my birthday on Wednesday.

"So I'm worried, you see? My mother's the only family I've got and if she's gone, I won't have anyone. Except maybe Luna, because she might be my cousin because my mum' s maiden name is Lovegood, but mum isn't replying to my letters so I don't know if she's related to Luna's dad, but anyway Luna might be my cousin and I'm so worried about my mum and when that guy hurt Luna I just reacted. Because she might be _family,_ and I don't have enough of that to be okay with her getting hurt. I can't even say it's a blur because I've got an eidetic memory, but even though I can remember it all happening it doesn't feel like it really happened, like I did that to that kid."

When he ran out of words to say (and he was amazed that Flitwick let that bit of rambling go on for as long as it did) Spencer looked at his professor again, which he hadn't done since he'd started talking. The professor's face held a thoughtful look.

"Usually, when something like your assault on Mr. Johnson occurs, I would assign a lot of detentions, and I will be assigning you detentions, have no doubt about that, Mr. Reid, and I would usually write your mother explaining the situation. But, I feel that under these circumstances, and given the severity of what occurred, we might need to go explain what happened in person, don't you agree, Spencer? And, under the circumstances, I think I could lessen your amount of detentions if you'll agree to a two day suspension, beginning this afternoon and ending Sunday evening."

Spencer was confused. Was his professor trying to offer to take him home to check on his mother, and disguising it as a punishment? That's certainly what it sounded like.

"Umm- That sounds like a really fair punishment, sir, considering- considering the damage I caused. And, just to clarify, Professor, my suspension would be spent at home, right?" Spender had never been good at talking to people, and trying to covertly make sure he was on the same page as his professor was a lot more difficult than Spencer expected.

"Exactly, Mr. Reid. And, just so you know, there's a store in Diagon Alley that can sell you a set of mirrors that could help with your particular… family communication issues. I'll write down the name of the store for you while you go get anything you'll need during your suspension. Meet me back here in twenty minutes, Mr. Reid, and we'll floo to London. I'll have to tell the headmaster about this, of course, but I'll do that while you pack."

"…Thank you, sir."

* * *

To say Diana Reid was shocked to see her son and his tiny professor on her doorstep would be an understatement. She almost didn't believe they were real. Hearing from the professor that Spencer had assaulted another student and was being suspended for two days did not help her to believe they were actually there; in no way did what she was hearing fit with the image she had of her son. He was usually the one who got beat up and picked on by other students, never was he the aggressor in any situation.

But she invited them in and listened as the small man who introduced himself as Spencer's Head of House told her what had happened and then excused himself, saying he would be back for Spencer on Sunday.

After a couple hours of his quiet presence keeping her company, reading in front of the fire while she prepared for upcoming lecture, Diana had decided that, real or not, she was glad to have her son home for a while.

At least, Spencer's presence was quiet and comforting until he went into the kitchen to prepare a pot of tea and noticed a pile of unread letters sitting on their table.

"Mum!" he called, gathering up the pile and stomping back into their sitting room. "Did you even open _one_ letter I sent you since I left?"

"Of course I did, Spencer. I read the one you sent telling me you were sorted into Ravenclaw. But I thought it would be much more interesting to let you tell me all about your adventures at school when I saw you in person, so I didn't touch the others. But you're home early, so tell me about school! How is it? Are you making friends this time?"

Spencer wasn't happy with his mother's plan. _She let me worry for over a month. I got so worried that I lost control and_ attacked _someone. Merlin, what a mess._ He put his hand in his pocket, feeling the note Flitwick had given him explaining about magical mirrors that could be used for communication and where to find them to purchase a set.

"Mum…," he pushed down the hurt caused by her actions, trying to understand her reasoning, and willed himself not to let her know that it was his worry for her that had caused him to lose control today. "Hogwarts is fine. I'll- I'll be back in a little while, mum, I'm going to go out for a bit."

He didn't really give her much of a chance to stop him, just went to his bag and grabbed the coin purse containing what spending money he had, and left the flat. As much as he'd needed to be home, he needed to get out for a while. Now.

The trip to Diagon Alley was short and he was familiar with the route, having taken it many times over the years since he'd first visited. He'd never noticed the shop that the note in his pocket directed him to, but he knew it wouldn't be too difficult to find.

If his mother wanted to listen to him telling her about his day, and see his face as he did so, instead of read about it in letters, these mirrors might be just what they needed.

While walking through the bustling streets of London, Spencer made a mental note to thank his professor for everything he'd done when Flitwick came to pick him up in a couple of days.


	4. First Year Highlights

_They may have cost most of the spending money I've ever managed to save,_ Spencer thought as he ended a mirror call with his mother, _but these mirrors were worth every knut._

Things had been better for Spencer in the last three weeks than they'd been since he arrived at Hogwarts. Diana Reid couldn't always be counted on to answer his calls on the mirror he'd bought during his suspension, but getting to talk to her face-to-face once in a while, actually _see_ that she was okay without him, did a lot to ease Spencer's worries.

As he walked from the room he shared with his year-mates in Ravenclaw Tower down to the Great Hall for the Halloween feast, Spencer thought about how things seemed to be looking up for him at Hogwarts. Granted, he had detentions with Filch twice a week until the winter holidays began, but that was his own fault and could have been a lot worse- he could have been expelled. Or the detentions could be with Snape.

Yes, things were going well at Hogwarts for once and Spencer, without worries about his mother plaguing his mind at every moment, was back to being able to pour his attention into his academic pursuits. It wasn't that he'd truly been doing poorly in his classes before his suspension (Spencer would never be able to allow himself to do truly sub-par work) but more than one Professor had commented on how he seemed to be doing better than before and that they were very impressed by his work, and pleased to see his mood had improved. Most of them attributed the change to finally managing to settle in at Hogwarts.

Only one person knew the reason for the turn around, and the Head of Ravenclaw hadn't brought it up much; he'd asked, while picking Spencer up from his flat in London at the end of his short suspension, "Did you manage to get things worked out here so that you can focus on your schooling, Spencer? I'd hate to see a young man of your potential leave Hogwarts." And though that was the only time Flitwick actually said anything about the situation, Spencer received a few beaming smiles in class when he answered a question especially well, demonstrating a far better understanding of the material than was expected of a first year, and he'd been left a few comments on his _nearly_ perfect essays, comments that showed that Flitwick was truly proud of Spencer for the work he was doing and offering him suggestions for things he might be interested in researching further.

Spencer liked the quiet attention and guidance, liked making someone proud of him. It felt good to have someone take an interest in him, in mentoring him. Charms was quickly becoming the subject he poured the most effort into. He didn't want to make his professor regret the help he'd given Spencer.

 _Yes,_ Spencer thought, walking through the stone hallways that were slowly seeming more and more like home, _things at Hogwarts are definitely looking up, and with the situation with mum mostly handled I might be able to have a_ normal _time for the rest of the term._

* * *

The legendary Hogwarts rumor mill was running wild. Apparently Harry Potter, Savior of the Wizarding World, and his friends, Hermione Granger and Ronald Weasley, had killed the caretaker's cat during the feast and written a threat to their enemies in blood. Yes, in _blood._

Spencer hadn't spoken to any of them himself, but from what he'd heard he didn't think this rumor seemed like the Gryffindors' style.

Thinking back, though, Spencer realized the distinctive trio actually _had_ missed the Halloween feast.

 _Huh, maybe I spoke too soon about things finally being normal._

The boy-genius couldn't help but wonder what else the term could possibly have in store.

* * *

A series of disasters. That's what the term had in store, as Spencer soon discovered.

Through his detentions with Filch, Spencer came to understand that the cat, Mrs. Norris, wasn't actually dead, just petrified.

But then it wasn't just Mrs. Norris. Soon enough, a Gryffindor first year was petrified. Spencer's classes with the other Gryffindors were suddenly a lot less raucous than before; the first year lions were terrified and confused, deeply feeling the loss of one of their own. The loss seemed to be hitting Ginny Weasley especially hard, and Spencer assumed they must have been friends. He knew Colin had never been around whenever Luna coerced him into leaving Ravenclaw Tower or the library to spend time with Ginny, who she'd apparently known her entire life, but that didn't meant he two weren't friends.

And then it was a Hufflepuff. And a _ghost._

That was when Spencer got scared. _How do you hurt a bloody ghost? What kind of magic can_ do _that?_

Through his slight fear, Spencer noticed a trend in the victims of the attacks. The two living, human victims were both from completely muggle families. _Like everyone thinks I am,_ Spencer couldn't help but think. But it wasn't a pattern until there were three people who fit the trend, he knew. There was no need to freak out yet. _With the information we have so far, it could just be a coincidence._ But with what he'd been able to find out about the Chamber of Secrets, he didn't think it was likely to be a coincidence.

Pattern or coincidence, it didn't matter to Spencer. He was anxiously awaiting his weeks at home over the holiday, away from the fear that had begun to permeate the castle.

The last day of classes before the students would board the train for London was a Friday. His last class of the week was always an enjoyable one, and this week was no different. Professor Flitwick used the time to teach them charms for holiday decorating: creating floating golden bubbles, a charm that would instantly put all of your decorations onto a tree, and the like.

As the class was released, grinning and cheery first years fled the room, all excited for the upcoming break from schoolwork, Spencer heard his Head of House call for him to stay behind for a moment.

 _Uh-oh,_ the boy thought, _I haven't done something wrong, have I?_

"Mr. Reid, I have a question for you. I was recently speaking with Professor Burbage, she teaches muggle studies, you know, and she was telling me about the muggle education system. She spoke about their university system and it reminded me of something you said during our last little chat, back in October, you remember? You mentioned that if you were to be at home instead of here, you might go to University during the day and be home each night…"

"Yes, sir. I remember the conversation." _The one that led to my suspension._

"Good, good. Now, I was wondering if you could help me to understand something. Professor Burbage led me to believe that muggle students don't usually start at a University until they're seventeen or eighteen…"

 _And you want to know why I thought I could start at one now._

Spencer started to flush. He'd not exactly managed to hide some of his more…abnormal traits (the high IQ and eidetic memory combined with a tendency toward rambling, made that nearly impossible), but nobody at Hogwarts was aware of just how abnormal he was considered to be in the muggle world. Most just chalked it up to him being another know-it-all Ravenclaw.

"I- you see- I skipped a few years." He mumbled, still flushing lightly. _Why am I embarrassed? Mum would kill me for being embarrassed about being smart._

"I'm sorry? I didn't quite catch that."

Squaring his shoulders, and taking comfort from the memories of his mother reminding him that intelligence was nothing to be ashamed of, Spencer looked his professor in the eyes and explained. "I've got an eidetic memory and can read approximately twenty thousand words per minute, as well as an abnormally high intelligence quotient. I skipped a few years' worth of schooling in the muggle education system."

"Oh, wonderful! I thought it must be something like that." The little professor's excitement was almost tangible, making his powerful magic vibrate through the classroom. "Tell me, how would you feel about doing something similar here at Hogwarts? Skipping a year, I mean."

"Sir?" His shock was evident in his voice, which came out as a sort of broken squeak.

"I noticed that you're ages ahead of your peers in my class, and according to the mid-year reports from your other professors I'm not the only one to notice such a thing. Tell me, what's the most advanced charm you've managed? I know you practice outside the classroom, so don't lie to me; I'm not going to get you in trouble for just wanting to learn, Spencer. After all, what sort of Head of Ravenclaw would I be if I stopped students from trying to learn?"

Feeling the flush begin again, Spencer mumbled "I'm working on the summoning charm right now."

"That's part of the fourth year course work! Wonderful, wonderful! Would you show me your progress?"

Spencer glanced back into his professor's eyes, looking away quickly after seeing the pride clearly visible on the professor's face, and looked around the room, trying to find something light to summon. Lighter objects were easier that heavy ones, he'd noticed the day before.

Spotting a quill abandoned on the stone floor, he pointed his wand and with a quickly thought _Accio quill!_ it was zooming across the classroom and into his waiting hand.

"That was…silent! This is simply wonderful."

"I had to learn silent casting so as not to wake up the others in my dorm while I practice, sir."

Spencer was beginning to feel like a bit of a sideshow act. He knew it wasn't the professor's intention to make him uncomfortable, but if he heard the word "wonderful" one more time Spencer thought he might have to run from the room.

Flitwick just chuckled at his response. "If you're this far ahead in any of your other classes, I see no reason for you to remain with your current peers next September." (Spencer wasn't quite that far ahead in his other classes, but since he was still very much far ahead in those anyway he decided not to clue Professor Flitwick in on that fact.) "If you'd be willing to take final exams with both the second and first years in May, I think you'd really do well to skip a level. Unfortunately, it's unprecedented that a student skip multiple years of schooling at one time, so we couldn't get you placed any higher than third year."

The talk of skipping multiple years reminded Spencer of his years as a child-genius in London. He remembered being tormented, bullied, and harassed for being so abnormal. It wasn't something he wanted to experience at Hogwarts. He'd had enough of that for a lifetime. And he definitely didn't want to know what classmates who were older, larger, and able to wield magic could do to make him miserable.

"I- I'm honored, sir, that you'd take such an interest in my education, especially after…after what happened a few months ago. But, I think I'd like to stay with my age group. I've- I've already experienced being the youngest in my classes, and I think I'd like to stay with my peers this time around."

Sensing the professor's shock, Spencer quickly made his excuses and fled the classroom.

* * *

He'd never been one to hide details of his education from his mother, but by the end of the holiday Spencer found himself wishing he'd kept his big mouth shut about his discussion with Flitwick. He'd told her about it on one of her clearer days, which were few and far between during his visit. She'd immediately wanted to see him perform some spells for her, and had been highly disappointed when he reminded her about the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery. The subject had been dropped immediately afterwards.

The next time it was brought up, his mother was pressuring him to accept the offer. To take whatever advantages came his way. He refused. She was, again, highly disappointed.

He felt like a terrible person for disappointing her.

The less-than-clear state she'd been in for the fortnight he was home made it impossible for him to ask her if she knew Luna's dad, which was something he'd been wanting to know for months. Spencer knew he would ask eventually, but he wasn't sure when the right time would be. He was worried that the question might upset her if they really were related, and he was worried that the answer would upset him if they weren't. He liked Luna; liked the idea of the slightly strange but brilliant in her own way girl being his cousin.

On the day he left for Kings Cross, he told her he'd think about the offer, but wasn't making any promises. But he knew, once he say the joy in her eyes at his concession, that he would have to accept the offer. He didn't want to disappoint his mother again.

* * *

Before the welcoming feast was even over, the rumor that Hermione Granger had been petrified over the break was already spreading like wildfire.

He didn't see her in the Great Hall, but both Potter and Weasley looked too happy for such a thing to have happened, so Spencer didn't believe it.

A week later, she was back in classes and the rumor stopped. Apparently she just caught a bug and had to spend some time in the Hospital Wing.

In the meantime, Spencer approached his Head of House and asked if his offer was still available. It was. And when Spencer accepted, Flitwick was overjoyed. "Wonderful!" he'd declared.

And then the day of the quidditch match came around. Spencer was taking advantage of the blessedly empty library when he heard girls whispering not far from his location. Annoyed, he'd gone to them off.

When he saw Hermione Granger and Penelope Clearwater furiously whispering, overheard something about "snakes" and "pipes", and saw Hermione sigh in relief when Penelope pulled a small mirror out of her bag, he decided that he didn't want to know what they were involved in and that, since they appeared to be on their way out of the library anyway, it wasn't worth telling them to be quiet.

When he heard another girl shrieking in the hallway not five minutes later, Spencer felt the bottom of his stomach drop out with dread. Gathering his courage, and making sure he had his wand at the ready, the Ravenclaw went to investigate the disturbance.

Madam Pince was already on her way, ready to reprimand whoever would make so much noise anywhere near her library, and he followed not far behind her.

The scene they stumbled upon, literally, was one that made him wish with all his might that his eidetic memory would fail and this wouldn't be forever seared into his memory. The terrified faces of the petrified girls and the way the girl who found them, who he recognized as another sixth year Ravenclaw, one of Penelope's dorm-mates, tried fruitlessly to wake Penelope were things Spencer would rather forget.

Understood petrification in theory was one thing, but tripping over Hermione Granger's body, cold and hard as stone, was another thing entirely.

He later told Professor McGonagall what he'd seen happening between the girls in the Library, but knew it didn't make any more sense to her than it did to him.

And then Professor Dumbledore, the one whose mere presence was supposed to be enough to scare away any evil in the vicinity, was removed from Hogwarts.

Spencer did not sleep well for the next weeks. He had nightmares. Vivid nightmares in which the people he knew all ended up cold and hard as stone wearing the most terrified expressions he could imagine. Sometimes it was his own body on the floor, and he witnessed it from the outside. Then he would catch a glimpse of himself in a nearby reflective surface and see that he was a ghost, looking at his own dead body. Dead, not petrified.

The night Ginny Weasley was taken, Spencer refused to go back to his room; he knew the nightmares would begin the second he fell asleep. Instead he sat with Luna in the common room in front of the fire. He didn't know how to comfort her as she grieved for her lost friend, whose skeleton would apparently lie in the chamber forever; he had no idea what to do for her, but he tried.

He tried everything he'd ever heard of or seen in films or read of in books that seemed to comfort people. He talked, telling her stories about 'strange' muggle inventions, he tried rubbing her back as she sobbed into his shoulder (ignoring the way he wanted to flinch away from the prolonged physical contact), he made tea and offered her the last of his chocolate frogs. But Luna was inconsolable, and he could understand (to a certain extent). Ginny was her first friend, her only companion for the last few years, just like Luna was his first real friend; he didn't even want to imagine the sort of state he'd be in if it was her locked away dying in a hidden chamber of this supposedly safe castle.

Sometime in the wee hours of the morning, Dumbledore's voice boomed throughout every inch of the castle ( _a sonorous charm_ , Spencer noted absently, simultaneously wondering when the Headmaster had returned to the school)requesting that all students and staff join him in the Great Hall.

Luna didn't want to go, didn't want to leave her spot in front of the fire that had roared on all night, seeming to understand that it was needed and never dimming even a bit. It took the combined efforts of Spencer and the fifth year girl prefect whose name he'd never learned to cajole her into going downstairs, insisting that if Dumbledore was back and calling them out of bed at this time of night then it must be really important.

 _They're closing the school,_ Spencer thought _. They're going to tell us to pack our things and be ready to leave in the morning._

He took steadying breaths the whole trip down to the Great Hall, knowing that if he panicked it wouldn't help Luna in the least.

The Ravenclaws, who lived furthest from the Great Hall, were some of the last students to get there, but they could hear the commotion before they even reached the Entrance Hall.

"That…doesn't sound like what I expected," someone muttered. There were several sounds of agreement.

The raucous laughter and shouts of joy coming from the direction of the Great Hall had them all curious. Walking in to the room and seeing for themselves what had caused the commotion had them all nearly ready to cry from joy. There, surrounded by crowds of people and handing out hugs like candy on Halloween, were all of the petrified students. Moving, talking, and laughing. Faces no longer frozen in terror.

Spencer's eyes searched out the most recent victim from this disaster and landed on a cluster of red-heads near the Gryffindor table. There! He saw her! "Luna! Luna, look! Ginny's okay."

Luna followed his eyes to the gaggle of fiery-haired Gryffindors, then took off. While following at a more sedate pace, he watched her progress across the Great Hall. She was running through the crowd, dodging flailing limbs and barreling right through groups of students when necessary. She only stopped in time to avoid slamming into one of the Weasley twins. He couldn't tell what was said, but he saw a few quick words exchanged before the first year girls leapt at one another, hugging away the pain of the last few hours.

Spencer was pleased to see Ginny holding just as tightly to Luna as Luna was to Ginny. He'd never been sure whether Ginny knew how much her friendship meant to Luna. It would have been an easy thing for Ginny not to notice or understand since Ginny came from such a large and obviously loving family, whereas Ginny had been Luna's only companion of her age for many years.

The rest of the night passed quickly, and nearly everyone rejoiced when Dumbledore announced that final exams would be cancelled.

The next day, Spencer received a note from his Head of House telling him that, though final exams were cancelled and he wouldn't need to take the usual first-year tests, if he still wanted to skip into classes with the third years then he would need to see each of his professors so that they could make a formal assessment of his knowledge of second year material.

He still wasn't excited about the prospect of skipping a year and drawing all of that attention, but he knew he'd have to do it now that he'd already told his mom he would. He didn't do well with disappointing people.

And so he found time in the last few days of the term to see each of his professors, and he showed them the proof that he'd be able to handle third year material. Everyone involved in the testing already knew that it was unnecessary, but the procedures had to be followed.

As all of the other students happily packed their belongings, excited for the summer to start, Spencer couldn't decide how he felt. On one hand, he was ready to be back in London, taking summer courses at a university and working on his own research and projects in muggle subjects, but on the other hand he didn't want to be back in London. He didn't want to be home with just his mother; he had a friend and many decent acquaintances he didn't want to leave behind at Hogwarts.

Soon, though, his feelings on the subject didn't matter one way or the other; it was time to go and there was nothing he could do about it.


	5. September 1st, 1993

Summer was worse than Spencer anticipated.

Diana Reid's condition had deteriorated over the course of the few months between Spencer's return to school in January and his arrival in London in June. The good days were coming less often than before, and the days that, years ago, Spencer would have called "bad days" had become "a-little-worse-than-okay days."

One particularly memorable incident a couple of days before his return to Hogwarts (not that Spencer could forget any moment of the dreadful summer) left him with a rather large water burn on his forearm, and he was anxiously awaiting the opportunity to make a burn relief salve in the small potions lab tucked away in Ravenclaw Tower.

About the only things Spencer would call "good" about the summer were the exceptional grades he'd managed in his summer courses (not that he expected anything less from himself) at local universities and finally managing to get an answer from his mother about whether or not she had any living relatives in the wizarding world. And, in fact, she did; Diana's only known relative was a brother named Xenophilius. Spencer's heart had soared at this admission, because that meant Luna really, truly was his cousin. His _first_ cousin, even. And he couldn't wait to tell her.

So when the first of September rolled around and Spencer found himself loading his trunk onto the scarlet steam engine, he was understandably excited to be going back to school. Even the reminder of his imminent return to being the school freak, the kid too smart for his own good, as he'd always been in his muggle schools, barely managed to dim his spirits.

When Luna joined him in his compartment on the train, he hesitated to tell her about his discovery. _How do you tell a friend that you've suspected you were cousins since the first moment you knew her name but it took you an entire year to let them know? She'll be so angry,_ he thought.

His opportunity to tell her was taken by the untimely arrival of Ginny Weasley, who quietly asked if she could share their compartment. "Of course," they had to say. "We'd love to catch up with you."

And they did catch up, and it wasn't bad, really, even though Spencer wished he'd had a few more minutes alone with Luna to be able to tell her his news. The trip began enjoyably, the first few hours zooming by in a candy fueled rush of conversation, mostly led by Ginny as she told them about her large family's vacation to Egypt to visit her older brother Bill. Spencer was fascinated by the idea of her brother's work as a cursebreaker.

But the fun was abruptly ended when the train slid to a stop, far early than it should have, and the air became strangely cold. Spencer had no idea what was going on, and a look at the girls told him that they were just as clueless. As the windows in their compartment began to frost, Spencer began to worry, and feel a despair he hadn't imagined possible. His worst memories rose to the forefront of his mind (though they were never far away, due to his abnormally powerful memory) and the force of them all hitting at once was gut-wrenching. Distantly, he noticed that Luna and Ginny weren't faring any better than he was under the sudden, unnatural onslaught. He vaguely heard screaming coming from somewhere on the train, though the fog in his mind wouldn't allow his to determine where it was coming from.

When Ginny fainted, Spencer fought against the deluge of his worst memories, forcing his mind to remember better times in an effort to bring some balance and clarity back to him. It worked, sort of; it worked enough that he could climb across the compartment to where Ginny lay, twitching slightly in fear, on the floor.

"Come on, Ginny," he called, lightly slapping her face, trying to bring her back to consciousness. "Remember something good, it'll help. Think about last year, when everyone was so happy to see you alive and all of your family was there after Harry rescued you. How about this summer, seeing Bill and Egypt and the twins trying to lock Percy in a pyramid?" _It's working,_ he thought as her eyes began to open just the tiniest bit. _It must have been easier for me because of the eidetic memory; all of my good memories were easier to access than they must be for Ginny right now._ "Come on, please wake up, Ginny."

And then it was over. He caught a glimpse through the glass door of the compartment of something large and silver and glowing barreling down the corridor, chasing after something so black he could barely see it in the dark of the train, and then the cold was gone, chased away by whatever it was Spencer had seen in the corridor.

 _Magic is weird,_ Spencer thought _. One second we're freezing and drowning in our own nightmares, and in the next second everything is fine._

Ginny woke. Luna snapped out of the haze of bad memories.

Spencer wasn't sure what had just occurred, but he knew he never wanted it to happen again.

"What the bloody hell was that all about?"

"I have no clue, Ginny. But I'm sure we'll find out when we get to Hogwarts. How are you feeling? And you, Luna?"

"I'm feeling like I'll never have a normal year at Hogwarts."

Spencer was beginning to feel the same way, and could only nod in agreement with Ginny's statement.

* * *

The rest of the train ride passed without incident (though there was an unexpected delivery of hot cocoa to every compartment via the trolley, which helped a lot with any lingering effects of what Spencer would later discover were dementors).

The Sorting and feast were much the same as the year before, leaving only Dumbledore's speech after the feast as something worth noticing. There was a bit of an uproar when the headmaster announced that Hogwarts would be 'guarded' by monsters that had invaded the train. Nobody was happy about that; though some people were more bothered than others. Spencer rightfully imagined that the people more bothered by the announcement were the ones who'd had stronger reaction to the dementors on the train.

A few more things worth noting happened once the Ravenclaws had arrived in the Tower. First of all, Spencer experienced a brief moment of confusion when he followed his old classmates into the room they had shared the previous year and found one less bed than the year before. And there was no sign of his luggage in the room, meaning that the missing bed was his.

In the common room he found Penelope Clearwater, who explained to him that his belongings had been moved into the third-year boys' dorm, as those were his new classmates. She looked at him like he was an idiot for not figuring that out on his own, and Spencer honestly felt like one.

Finding his way to his new room wasn't difficult, but ignoring the questioning looks of his new dorm-mates was. He solved the problem by making it easy for everyone to pretend he wasn't there by closing the curtains around his bed and settling in to review the third year material he'd looked at the previous year.

 _Thirteen year old boys haven't figured out object permanence, right? If they can't see me, I don't exist._

The only problem with his plan was the commotion that could soon be heard from the common room. And, as much as Spencer would like to think he was too mature for such things, he _really_ wanted to know what was going on down there. When he heard the other boys leave to check it out, Spencer decided it was safe enough to leave his bed and find out what was going on.

However, things started to get weird almost as soon as he left the confines of his four-poster.

 _Wait a second. Weren't there four beds in here earlier? Where did that fifth one come from?_

Thinking back to ten minutes earlier, Spencer was positive that only four beds had been in the room when he closed the curtains around his bed. But sometime in those ten minutes a fifth had appeared, right next to his, and the room had grown a bit to compensate for the added furniture.

 _What the fuck is happening,_ he wondered as he left the room.

The first thing he noticed upon entering the common room was that there was a crowd of Ravenclaws gathered around the foot of the girls' staircase. And they all seemed to be eagerly watching as a third year girl Spencer thought was named Avery approached the stairs leading to the girls' rooms.

And Avery looked to be somewhere between incredibly excited and incredibly confused as she started climbing the stairs at a run. Spencer understood the commotion almost immediately when, as he watched, the stairs turned into a slide, sending Avery plummeting back to the bottom.

The Ravenclaws, always interested in a good mystery, were all talking in small groups, trying to figure out why the stairs were suddenly rejecting someone who'd been able to climb them every day for the last two years to get to her dorm.

He watched as Penelope encouraged the girl to try one more time and wondered what the point of trying again could possibly be. _Haven't they figured out yet that if it doesn't work the first few times, trying the exact same thing won't change the result?_

And when the girl was sent plummeting right back into the thick blue carpeting at the base of the stairs-turned-slide, Spencer wasn't surprised.

As Avery and Penelope left the common room to search for Professor Flitwick, who would hopefully be able to solve the issue for them, Spencer noticed a few of the other girls tentatively trying out the stairs and breathing sighs of relief when the stairs remained as they should be, allowing the girls to climb to the peace of their beds.

As the rest of the House began to trickle back to bed, Spencer shrugged and did the same, knowing that he'd find out what was happening by breakfast tomorrow at the absolute latest.

Arriving at his new room, Spencer heard one of the other boys exclaim "Bloody hell! Where'd this fucking bed come from? Are we getting another pipsqueak in here with us? Who's it gonna be this time, a fucking first year?"

Blushing slightly and trying to ignore the comment, Spencer went back to his bed, once again closing the curtains and trying to quietly work on reviewing the spells he'd need for classes this year.

An hour or so later, just as he was considering going to work on that burn relief salve he needed, there was a happy little knock on the door of the room, and he heard the sound of someone entering. Peeking through the curtains, he saw Professor Flitwick entering, followed closely by the girl who'd been having trouble with the stairs, who Spencer thought he'd heard called Avery. Spencer made short work of straightening out his rumpled clothes and opening the curtains to his bed, all the while wondering when girls and professors started visiting the boys' dorms.

"Good Evening, boys. I hope you're all settling back in okay," the tiny Head of Ravenclaw began, before noticing the sixth bed in the room. "Oh, look! The castle has already taken care of moving your belongings for you, Avery!"

Avery just blushed and ran her hand through her short, messy hair in what was clearly a nervous habit.

"I hope you boys don't mind Avery here moving in; Hogwarts seems to have evicted him from his old room."

 _Wait,_ Spencer's mind blanked. _Him? His old room? What?_

A quick look at the other boys in the room showed that they had no more idea about what was going on than Spencer did. Not that Spencer found that exactly reassuring; he was used to understanding more than his classmates, and suddenly being just as confused as everyone else wasn't something he liked.

"Err- Professor? Isn't Avery supposed to, you know, live with the girls?"

"Not anymore, boys, but I think Avery wants to explain everything to you all himself; am I right, Avery?"

"Uh- Yes, sir. That's right," Avery replied, once again running her- _his?-_ fingers through his dirty blond hair in that nervous habit Spencer had noticed.

"Wonderful! I'll be just downstairs in the common room, sorting things out with Penelope, if you need me."

And with that the Professor gave a cheery wave and went back the way he'd come.

"So…," Avery began, as all of the room's earlier occupants sat down, waiting to hear the explanation of just what was going on. "I guess that one's my bed, then?" The room's newest occupant walked over to the only empty bed, hopping on and grabbing a pillow to clutch in his lap, before looking at the others in the room.

"What the hell is going on, Lester? First the stairs and now this?"

"Shut up, Terry. I'm getting to it. It's kind of hard to explain." Avery paused and took a steadying breath before continuing. "So, this summer, I was home. And met someone in London who helped me figure some stuff out about myself. So, long story short, the person I met was this woman named Christine, but she didn't always go by Christine; she used to be called Johnny. And she was raised as a boy. But she realized growing up that she didn't feel like a boy, and was a lot more comfortable when people called her Christine and used female pronouns instead of male ones when referring to her. You know, calling her a _her_ instead of a _him?_ "

Some of the boys looked skeptical, but everyone nodded, encouraging Avery to continue.

"So, basically, what I'm trying to tell you is that I'm like Christine, except the other way around. I feel like a _he,_ not a _she_. I guess I always have, but I never knew it was something that I was, you know … allowed to feel? So it didn't make sense to me until I met someone else like me. So, yeah, now I'm trying to transition into living as male. We're pretty sure that's what was causing the stairs to act up earlier; they were recognizing me as a guy, so they wouldn't let me up to my old room, which is why I'm here now. Does this all make sense to you guys?"

Spencer, having grown up in London, though not exactly educated on the topic, had met enough of a diverse sort of people in the city that he finally understood what was going on. He'd met a couple of people like the woman Avery had described (he thought the term for it all might be transgender or something like that but couldn't be positive- things he'd _heard_ didn't always stick in his memory as well as things he'd _seen_ ) but he'd never met someone who was – what was the word Avery had just used?- _transitioning_ into being a guy. He had a thousand questions, but he knew better than to go asking people about their personal business like that unless he wanted to get beat up or hexed. He figured if there was anything more that Avery wanted him or the others to know, then he would tell them; simple as that.

Seeing the questions, likely invasive, about to pour out of the mouths of the other boys, Spencer spoke up before they got the chance. "That's cool. Welcome to the room. Um- Is there anything you want us to know, other than what you've already said, or… boundaries or anything? Like, I don't know how things are in the girls' dorms, or really in this room since I just moved in myself, but I know the guys I was with last year weren't exactly shy, if you know what I mean?"

Not that he'd ever been one of those less than shy guys, but Spencer's dorm-mates the year before hadn't had any problem with wearing just their boxers around the room.

"Err- thanks for asking, actually, I hadn't thought about it. I guess, just, if my curtains are closed around my bed don't open them. And if you guys could wear _something_ when you're walking around then I would appreciate it. Oh! And don't touch me. I _will_ hex you if you do."

"Understood," the room's original three inhabitants said, all at once. Judging by the flash of fear on the faces of the boys, getting hexed by Avery wasn't a pleasant experience. Good thing Spencer had no plans to cross any of the boundaries Avery had set.

As the conversation wound down and everyone got ready to finally get some sleep that night (and Spencer waited for everyone to fall asleep so that he could _finally_ go make that burn relief salve he needed), the youngest of the five boys reflected on the day he'd had.

 _Nope, there's no such thing as a nice, normal, commotion-free year at Hogwarts. Merlin, I'm not ready for it if the whole year goes like this,_ he decided.

* * *

Sneaking back into the room a few hours later, Spencer was about ready to just fall into his bed. But as he opened the curtains around his four-poster, he heard the sounds of another set of curtains opening on the bed next to his. Turning around, he saw Avery leaning through a small gap in his curtains.

"Hey, kid. It's Spencer, right?"

Confused about why anyone else was awake, much less trying to have a conversation with him at three-something in the morning, Spencer replied with a not-exactly-eloquent "Yeah."

"Okay. So, Spencer, this is going to sound really weird, but do you happen to have extra uniform trousers that I can borrow until I can buy some during the first Hogsmeade weekend? I'll get you a new pair then and everything as a thank you. It's just… my mum wouldn't let me get any when we went to Diagon, because she didn't think the school would let me wear something that wasn't part of the girls' uniform. She's not really a fan of everything that's going on with me right now… And, you know, you're about my size..."

Too tired to really respond, Spencer just went to go looking through his trunk. He hadn't had a chance to unpack yet, but he knew that a few pairs of the trousers he'd gotten too tall for last year (which should make them about right for Avery's height) were buried near the bottom of the trunk. Finally managing to find what he was looking for, he grabbed the black material and handed it over to the blond boy whose body language told Spencer just how uncomfortable the boy had been with being forced to make this request, and the fact that he'd done it anyway told Spencer just how important it was to the boy.

"Those are from last year, and they're too short for me anyway. You can keep them. And you don't have to worry about replacing them." Spencer tried to offer a grin, which his face wasn't used to doing so he had no idea whether it came out okay or not, as he stepped closer to his bed and began to shut the curtains around him. He really was exhausted, social interaction was so tiring, and just wanted to go to sleep…

As he changed into pyjamas, he heard a whispered "Thank you, Spencer. Good night," and the curtains closing again around Avery's bed.

Spencer was asleep almost before his head hit his pillow.

* * *

Author's Note: So I'm just really fascinated by what it would be like to transition in the magical world? I haven't exactly figured out where Avery will fit into the story yet, but I'm not going to make him a background character. If you have issues with a transgender character, stop reading now and don't return; not only will you continue to have issues with this character, you and I will have issues as I am also transgender.

 _ **To the person who has been reviewing every chapter as a guest:**_ Thank you for your comments. It's nice to know that someone is really interested. _**About your concerns about any potential romantic**_ _ **subplots**_ **:** right now, I'm not intending for there to be any sort of relationship in this story; romance and relationships aren't something I write well, so the story will be more about Spencer growing into his own in the magical world. If there ever is any sort of relationship, it will be much further into the story and Spencer will be quite a bit older, and Hermione or an OC would probably be the person he's with. _**About academic competition between Hermione and**_ _ **Spencer**_ _:_ I haven't decided yet if either of them will really outshine the other. I'm kinda leaning toward their scores being pretty similar, and each being better than the other at some subjects. But, while Hermione is brilliant (and I agree with you that her brilliance was probably downplayed in the books to avoid making Harry and Ron look stupid) Spencer has the natural advantage of his impressive memory and of having found out about the wizarding world before her; there's just no way he hasn't memorized more information than she has.


	6. Year Two, Part 1

"Tybalt! You monster, where are you? Tybalt!"

Spencer woke on the first morning of classes to hushed, hissing calls for something called 'Tybalt' and the awareness that he wasn't alone in his bed. A quick glance toward his feet, where his unexpected visitor lazed, informed him that the missing Tybalt was most likely the kneazle that was currently doing its best to claim an entire half of Spencer's bed.

"Tybalt, mate, c'mon. Wherever you're hiding, you won't get fed until you come out. Tybalt!"

Groaning, Spencer decided there was no way he'd get any more rest this morning and sat up, simultaneously trying to rub the sleep from his eyes.

"Stupid beast," Spencer could hear Avery grumbling. "Where _is_ he?"

Looking at the kneazle, who gazed lazily back at him, informed Spencer that Tybalt had absolutely no intention of responding to his owner's calls if it would involve moving. With a huff, the boy climbed out of bed and grabbed the wayward animal from his bed. Ignoring the soft whine of annoyance that being picked up drew from Tybalt, Spencer opened his bed curtains and asked "Tybalt wouldn't happen to be an especially fat kneazle, would he?" to catch Avery's attention.

Whirling toward the sound of Spencer's voice, Avery barely managed to restrain a snort of laughter at the sight of the sleep-rumpled boy and the even sleepier pet. "Well, he's no kneazle, but that's him. He's just a normal cat; way too stupid to have any kneazle in him, believe me." Grabbing the cat from Spencer's arms and pulling him close in order to rub the cat's head, Avery continued speaking, this time clearly speaking more to Tybalt than to Spencer. "But he's so much more handsome than any kneazle; no, there's no way someone could think you're one of those hideous beasts, my beautiful little prince."

Rolling his eyes at the cooing, baby-speak voice his new classmate had adopted to speak to the cat, Spencer left the duo and went to take care of his morning routine in the ensuite that the third year boys used.

Later, after using a charm to take care of drying his hair and another to remove any wrinkles from the uniform he'd donned, Spencer set about tying his blue and bronze tie. He'd tried using a charm for that all of one time and he'd thought he might choke to death before managing to undo the far-too-tight knot from around his throat.

As soon as he was dressed for the day and had all of his textbooks shrunk to fit into in his satchel, Spencer went down to the common room, ready to wait for Luna to meet him so that they could walk to breakfast together. Their time together would probably be greatly limited by his new class schedule and different homework loads, but he was determined to insure that they remain friends.

 _And sometime today I need to tell her that I found out that we're cousins,_ Spencer reminded himself. He'd been distracted by other things the day before, but he knew he'd be able to find a minute at some point during the small trek across the castle to the Great Hall to let her know about his discovery.

As he settled into one of the comfortable wingback chairs with a good view of the entire, airy common room Spencer noticed he has a new shadow. Tybalt, the cute but (supposedly) stupid, cat had followed him, probably hoping for some attention. Spencer couldn't help wondering why this animal was apparently immune to the 'Reid Effect,' which had been shown to repel animals and small children. Sighing, but accepting that the cat liked him for whatever reason, Spencer didn't shove the animal away when he leaped into the chair and settled in Spencer's lap, occasionally pawing at Spencer until the boy gave in and scratched the cat's head until Luna arrived.

"Good morning, Spencer. When did you get a cat?" Looking up from the cat who had distracted him for the last twenty minutes or so, Spencer saw that Luna had managed to find him and get close without him noticing her presence.

"Hey," the boy replied. "Uh, he's not actually my cat. He just decided he likes me, I think." Standing up, Spencer deposited Tybalt in his vacated chair and indicated the common room door, "Ready for breakfast?"

"Of course. You know, you've got more wrackspurts buzzing around you today than usual."

After a year of knowing her, Spencer was familiar enough with Luna's strange way of speaking to know that this meant she could tell there was something on his mind. He couldn't believe in her strange creatures, but he did believe that _she_ believed in their existence, so that made it important enough for him to learn what the creatures were supposed to mean. Wrackspurts in large quantities meant that someone was pre-occupied.

"Yeah, they can probably tell that I've got something I want to tell you."

Luna didn't respond, just looked at him as they walked and waited for him to say whatever it was.

"I- uh- I don't think I've told you much about my mum, am I right? Well- she's- uh," he looked around, making sure nobody was around to hear him speak before continuing "she's a squib. And this summer I was finally able to ask her about her family. She told me that she has a brother, and I recognized his name. He's got a daughter here at Hogwarts."

"That's nice. Are you going to try to introduce yourself to her? I would say that you should, but you know that some people might not like the reminder that there's a squib in the family tree."

"Would it bother you if there was a squib in your family?"

Luna thought for a moment, and the fact that she had to think about it kind of worried Spencer, but then she shook her head. "No, I don't think it would. I don't see it as anything to be ashamed of, just like being a muggleborn isn't anything for someone to be ashamed of."

"Good." He didn't know how to finish telling her the most important part of what was on his mind, so he didn't say anything for a while as they walked along in silence. It wasn't until they were nearly reaching the entrance hall that the words came tumbling out of him. "We're cousins! My mum's estranged brother is your dad. I've thought we might be related since I first heard your last name, because it's my mum's maiden name, but I couldn't be sure as she never answered if I asked about her family until a few weeks ago. I'm sorry I didn't tell you!"

"Say that again? Slower, this time," she demanded.

He repeated himself.

"Okay, so I did hear you right. Woah." Suddenly her eyes lost the distant quality they usually held, and her focus was on him completely, suspicion written all over her face. "That's not the only reason you've been nice to me, right? Because you thought we might be related?"

"What? No! I'm nice because we're friends, and because you never gave me any reason to be anything other than nice!"

The suspicion faded almost instantly from Luna. "Good," she said. "I'm glad we're cousins."

And that was all that needed to be said.

* * *

That morning set up the pattern for the next few weeks of term. Every morning, Spencer would wake up to find that Tybalt had managed to sneak around whatever charms Spencer had put in place to keep him out (which prompted Spencer to believe that cat might not be as stupid as Avery claimed), and every morning he would be returned to Avery, who was becoming more jealous by the day of the fact that his cat liked Spencer so much. Then, every day, Spencer would get ready for classes and head down to breakfast with Luna. From there, the two would split up and go their separate ways for the day.

Spencer was amazed by the lack of hostility he faced from his new classmates. _Though_ , he supposed, _it's entirely possible that they've barely noticed my presence. Everyone is just too distracted by trying to wrap their minds around Avery and everything with him to pay any attention to a nerd who skipped a year of classes._

Everyone, except Hermione Granger, at least, was too distracted to care about the twelve year old in their classes. Granger was Not Pleased. He'd received a higher mark than her on a few assignments _(okay, most assignments, but only by a few points!)_ and he got the sense that Granger would never forgive him.

Over the first few weeks of the term, Spencer noticed that whenever the Gryffindors and Ravenclaws shared a class, there was a sense that Granger thought they were silently competing. Competing for what, Spencer couldn't be sure. Hogwarts' Nerdiest Third Year wasn't really a title he wanted to win.

Eventually, though, Granger got mad enough to say something to him about it. He sat in the library, casually flipping through some books he thought might be useful on the upcoming History of Magic exam, when she approached him.

"You _do_ know that in order to gain anything from looking at those books you need to actually _read_ them, right?"

"I _am_ reading them," he replied.

"You're just flipping the pages! If this is how you study, I don't understand how you got a perfect score on the Charms exam on Monday."

"I didn't cheat, if that's what you're implying."

She didn't believe him, Spencer could tell. Not that that bothered him; he was used to people thinking he'd cheated somehow.

"Not that I owe you any kind of explanation, but I have an eidetic memory, Granger. I can recite every word from the pages I've looked at in that book. It's not exactly difficult to answer questions on an exam when I can practically read my book or notes while doing so."

And so Hermione Granger became fascinated by Spencer Reid, enjoying that there was someone else in Hogwarts who knew as much, if not more, random information as she did.

Once she got past her dislike of him (which was easy to do once she could tell herself that his memory gave him an advantage she could never have, and it wasn't like he'd been doing better than her because she wasn't trying hard enough) it became common for the two to be seen studying together in the Library.

Once in a while, they'd even be joined by a few classmates. Mostly other Ravenclaws, as the other Gryffindors apparently didn't see much need to study, but occasionally Ginny would join them if Luna was there. Avery would show up every once in a while, as would a few of Spencer's other dorm-mates, though the former's presence was more common than the latter's.

Sometimes, when the quiet studying became too monotonous, they would leave the library and find a place to practice spells or play chess, or Gobstones or Exploding Snap if they had enough people.

As the days passed, Spencer settled into his new routine and began to wonder if this was what school was supposed to be like. His experiences with school before Hogwarts, back when he'd been the too-young genius in state-funded schools in London, hadn't left him with many good memories. But now he was getting used to having people he might almost consider friends, and he enjoyed it more than he'd ever imagined he might.

He even started to get excited about spending time with these people during the first Hogsmeade trip of the year, which Spencer would be allowed to go on since he'd already had his thirteenth birthday whem the time for the trip and his favorite holiday, Halloween, finally came.

Although, after the events that began on Halloween of the year previous, Spencer had begun to rethink his attachment to the holiday. He'd always loved the anonymity Halloween provided, with the option to dress up and throw on a mask, become anyone and everyone he'd ever wanted to be. But the opening of the Chamber of Secrets on the night of his first Halloween at Hogwarts had served as a powerful reminder that he wasn't the only one able to blend in on that night, especially in a place like Hogwarts.


	7. Halloween, 1993

_Absolutely anything can go wrong on Halloween in Hogwarts,_ Spencer reflected as he got the details about the night's events.

The day had just been too good to last. Spencer had gone out to Hogsmeade, promising to bring back some Honeydukes for Luna, and had enjoyed himself more than he'd expected. Avery had even bought Spencer a new pair of trousers to replace the ones Spencer had given him, despite all of Spencer's protests that it was unnecessary.

"Consider it a late birthday present if it makes you feel better," Avery had told him. "You've been a great friend and a lot more supportive than people I've known a lot longer than I've known you, and I don't know how else to thank you, so take the trousers and shut up."

Spencer walked around with a bit more pep in his step than usual for the rest of the day. Not because of the thank you/late birthday gift, but because of the fact that Avery considered them friends. All of Spencer's time in muggle schools had almost convinced him he would never have friends and though he had a fair amount of people he spent time with and was friendly with he always hesitated to call those people friends, too afraid of their rejection to take that step.

But then the good day had gone to shit.

Sirius Black breaking in hadn't been expected, but Spencer couldn't find it in himself to be surprised. Halloween, Spencer's favorite holiday for many years, which had started off so well this year, was swiftly becoming a night to dread. After the Feast had ended and everyone returned to their dorms, Dumbledore's voice sounded through the castle, commanding prefects to lead their houses back to the Great Hall. Once there, the Ravenclaws had all spotted a crowd surrounding the Gryffindor students and assumed that the commotion was their fault, only to find out that the notorious and escaped mass murderer had tried to break into Gryffindor Tower.

Hermione and her friends, Harry and Ron, claimed to be as confused as anyone about why Black had broken in, but Spencer noticed the furtive looks that the trio shared. And, judging by the stories he'd heard about how they were always caught up in the middle of everything, they had to know _something_ , Spencer was positive.

That was the first time that Spencer really interacted with Hermione's friends. He'd seen them all together, maybe said hello once or twice, but never spent any significant amount of time with them as the two tended to avoid academia like the plague, always making themselves scarce when Hermione went to the library for her frequent study sessions with Spencer and the others. That night was also the first time in _years_ that Spencer lost at chess to someone anywhere near his own age; he lost three games in a row to Ron Weasley and could barely believe it. Admittedly, though, he managed to put up a much better fight during the third match than he had during the first.

It was a learning experience and, Spencer had to admit, it was good for his ego to be taken down a bit.

 _I could probably stand to practice more than I do,_ he realized. _Maybe Weasley will want to play again sometime?_

Black managed to escape, and life settled back into its usual rhythm in the castle. However, people were more cautious than they'd been before, at least for a little while. Spencer definitely was, and he encouraged Luna to be; he was worried that her tendency to be lost in her own head would make her an easy target for a man like Black.

But the escaped murderer seemed to be gone, for the time being at least, and life had to go on.


End file.
